What would you have done?
Discussion
Basically had a car advertised on eBay, received an offer of £2300 via eBay - I counter offered £2400 and didn't hear back from the buyer. Then a day later I was offered £2500 (again through ebay) which I accepted before realising it was the same guy. At this point alarm bells started ringing.
I review his details & he is a Nigerian guy with a UK address registered. I've sold cars to people from Africa before, sold a Vitara to a couple of Nigerians last year - they met me at Manchester Airport, paid cash & off they went. All was OK so I wasn't too worried.
Anyway, didn't hear from him the next day - the mobile number he had registered with eBay was going to answerphone (orange network btw). I kept trying & eventually his phone rang (UK ring tone) and went to answerphone again. He then returned my call, asked who I was & why I was calling. I explained and after a long & awkward pause he muttered something incoherently and said he'll send me an email.
Then I receive this email:
"I just got to read your mail,I am currently away in Greece and would be back on the 27th however i can arrange for a friend to pick it up where you are but i wont be able to pay by cash apart from the fact that i always prefer to make payments through paypal for security reasons and also because i am not around to see to it.So please let me have your paypal account so i can make the transfer to you and get my friend to call you as its quite expensive to call from here.
Cheers"
Now I'm familiar with 419 scams, paypal chargeback etc. but what's puzzling me is that he is clearly in the UK, and has decent enough feedback on eBay for buying items.
I replied, along the lines of this is very suspicious etc. etc.
Then I get this reply:
"Right....First of all I am not in the UK,secondly I would never pay anybody with cash because of my experience with assholes cocksuckers like you...You sound desperate and naïve just like the idiot that I paid £100 deposit to for a 406 in April only to find out he didn't have any car for sale and said he sold it to someone else..it took me another 3weeks to get the money off him after a lot of calls to him and ebay a negative feedback before he refunded my money.My full name is ... and I live in ... I have got no skeleton in my cupboard and no reason to fear no moda f
ker not even a criminal that's trying to scam me off my 2500,wait a min,what if you sold me a stolen car??? How would I let ebay or paypal know? After I paid you with cash??? Give me an Answer ,what would be my evidence or proof that truly paid for the car apart from a worthles paper?"
This went on & on and got pretty nasty but I'm sure you get the idea. I basically told him to fk off etc. etc. and he's hitting me with the race card saying not all Nigerians are scammers etc.
Part of me is thinking if he was trying to scam me then I wouldn't have heard back from him after he'd been rumbled. What is your take on this situation? What would you have done in my position?
I review his details & he is a Nigerian guy with a UK address registered. I've sold cars to people from Africa before, sold a Vitara to a couple of Nigerians last year - they met me at Manchester Airport, paid cash & off they went. All was OK so I wasn't too worried.
Anyway, didn't hear from him the next day - the mobile number he had registered with eBay was going to answerphone (orange network btw). I kept trying & eventually his phone rang (UK ring tone) and went to answerphone again. He then returned my call, asked who I was & why I was calling. I explained and after a long & awkward pause he muttered something incoherently and said he'll send me an email.
Then I receive this email:
"I just got to read your mail,I am currently away in Greece and would be back on the 27th however i can arrange for a friend to pick it up where you are but i wont be able to pay by cash apart from the fact that i always prefer to make payments through paypal for security reasons and also because i am not around to see to it.So please let me have your paypal account so i can make the transfer to you and get my friend to call you as its quite expensive to call from here.
Cheers"
Now I'm familiar with 419 scams, paypal chargeback etc. but what's puzzling me is that he is clearly in the UK, and has decent enough feedback on eBay for buying items.
I replied, along the lines of this is very suspicious etc. etc.
Then I get this reply:
"Right....First of all I am not in the UK,secondly I would never pay anybody with cash because of my experience with assholes cocksuckers like you...You sound desperate and naïve just like the idiot that I paid £100 deposit to for a 406 in April only to find out he didn't have any car for sale and said he sold it to someone else..it took me another 3weeks to get the money off him after a lot of calls to him and ebay a negative feedback before he refunded my money.My full name is ... and I live in ... I have got no skeleton in my cupboard and no reason to fear no moda f
ker not even a criminal that's trying to scam me off my 2500,wait a min,what if you sold me a stolen car??? How would I let ebay or paypal know? After I paid you with cash??? Give me an Answer ,what would be my evidence or proof that truly paid for the car apart from a worthles paper?"This went on & on and got pretty nasty but I'm sure you get the idea. I basically told him to f
k off etc. etc. and he's hitting me with the race card saying not all Nigerians are scammers etc. Part of me is thinking if he was trying to scam me then I wouldn't have heard back from him after he'd been rumbled. What is your take on this situation? What would you have done in my position?
NEVER accept PayPal for goods collected in-person - there's zero need to pay their fees and you're handing control of the money to an organisation not exactly noted for fairness in customer service.
This applies to anything you sell - not just cars - the classic example is the person who sold some furniture, took PayPal Payment - furniture collected - few days later PayPal freezes his account for 'non-delivery' - he can't "prove" delivery and when he goes around to the address, guess who's not there anymore...
This applies to anything you sell - not just cars - the classic example is the person who sold some furniture, took PayPal Payment - furniture collected - few days later PayPal freezes his account for 'non-delivery' - he can't "prove" delivery and when he goes around to the address, guess who's not there anymore...
Thanks for confirming PH 
How about his UK mobile number with UK dial tone - never heard of a scammer who you can actually get in touch with. I know if it's a PAYG mobile they'll be no way of tracing him but he must be in the UK right? Unless he's in Nigeria but using a UK mobile phone?
How about his UK mobile number with UK dial tone - never heard of a scammer who you can actually get in touch with. I know if it's a PAYG mobile they'll be no way of tracing him but he must be in the UK right? Unless he's in Nigeria but using a UK mobile phone?
W7NNS said:
Thanks for confirming PH
How about his UK mobile number with UK dial tone - never heard of a scammer who you can actually get in touch with. I know if it's a PAYG mobile they'll be no way of tracing him but he must be in the UK right? Unless he's in Nigeria but using a UK mobile phone?
I've phoned some of them before - usually just to wind them up. He would have sent you an email purporting to be from Paypal saying that you had funds which would be released to you after delivery of the vehicle.How about his UK mobile number with UK dial tone - never heard of a scammer who you can actually get in touch with. I know if it's a PAYG mobile they'll be no way of tracing him but he must be in the UK right? Unless he's in Nigeria but using a UK mobile phone?
Scum sucking
s.
onesickpuppy said:
He would have sent you an email purporting to be from Paypal saying that you had funds which would be released to you after delivery of the vehicle.
Exactly what i was thinking - common scam.He probably is in the uk, many of them in london etc. Just claiming to be overseas at present
W7NNS said:
Basically had a car advertised on eBay, received an offer of £2300 via eBay - I counter offered £2400 and didn't hear back from the buyer. Then a day later I was offered £2500 (again through ebay) which I accepted before realising it was the same guy.
Ah, the old haggle upwards technique 
anonymous said:
[redacted]
Bethnal Green? Central line, "mind the closing doors" said in a tuneful and friendly manner. I think he's ace.BTW I think the scammer isn't a scammer cos scammers have to run many hundreds of scams in parallel to get a bite. they don't enter into abusive exchanges as a rule.
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